← Explore on the interactive map
Theodore Metochites
A 14th-century Byzantine scholar, poet, and statesman who served as Grand Logothete from the 1270s to 1328.…
Timeline
- 1290–1305Constantinople · Byzantine EmpireFrom a middle-class background, he entered the court of Andronikos II through his learning, studied philosophy and astronomy, gradually gained the emperor's trust, and entered the inner circle of finance and diplomacy.
- 1321–1328Chora Monastery (Constantinople) · ConstantinopleAt the height of imperial power in the 1320s he served as Grand Logothete, directing finance and diplomacy; he spent lavishly to restore the Chora Monastery, whose mosaics and frescoes became masterpieces of the Palaiologan Renaissance.
- 1328–1332Constantinople · Byzantine EmpireDismissed by the new regime after the coup of 1328, with his vast fortune confiscated; in later years he withdrew to a hermitage near the Chora Monastery, completing philosophical and poetic works including the 'Encomium of Learned Men', and died in 1332.
Sources
- Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium — Alexander Kazhdan et al. (1991)
- Byzantium: The Apogee — John Julius Norwich (1991)